Are Fundamentalist Christians Trying to Create a Master Race?

Perhaps you’ve watched the TV show “19 Kids and Counting” and wondered what that was all about. Who in their right mind would want to have that many children and put that kind of toll on their body and finances? The answer is that it’s the front of something rather sinister and disturbing.

Mitt Romney recently gave a commencement address at Southern Virginia University, a predominately Mormon school in Virginia, not far from where I grew up. In his speech, he encouraged students to get married young and have a lot of kids–a “quiver full” to be exact.

Of course, we know the GOP has been a fan of making sure as many white, Christian, future Republican-voting babies are born as possible. They’re counting on this as the way to keep the party alive and to ensure that there will always be people to unquestioningly work for the scraps off the fat cats’ table, all while blaming liberals for their lot in life.

But what is “quiver full”?

“Quiver full” is a movement within conservative, fundamentalist Christianity and Mormonism. It also extends to Catholics, as I can attest to from personal experiences. In a nutshell, the idea is to have as many children as possible in order for them to be “arrows in a quiver” for the “army of God,” often without regard for the health of the mother. It is a very patriarchal ideology in which sons are viewed as future “soldiers for Christ” and daughters are future bearers of more white, Christian babies to continue the cycle.

If this sounds like the “14 words” from the white nationalist/Neo-Nazi movement or even the following 88 word paragraph from Hitler’s “Mein Kampf,” you wouldn’t be far off.

“What we must fight for is to safeguard the existence and reproduction of our race and our people, the sustenance of our children and the purity of our blood, the freedom and independence of the fatherland, so that our people may mature for the fulfillment of the mission allotted it by the creator of the universe. Every thought and every idea, every doctrine and all knowledge, must serve this purpose. And everything must be examined from this point of view and used or rejected according to its utility.”

While religious and racial motivations for the “quiver full” movement aren’t usually publicly acknowledged by its adherents, behind closed doors they’re more likely to admit they believe that white Christians are being outgrown by other races and/or religions.

This isn’t your cross-burning, sheet-wearing racism. It’s not as blatant as that, but when you start comparing the ideologies and listening to the language used, it’s not hard to see where they have some very scary similarities.

There are quite a few people out there who still cling to the false notion that America was and always should be a predominantly white, Christian nation. They’re slowly shrinking, but they’re not going down without a fight.